Heavy D! (ヘビィ・D！, Hebī Dī!) first appeared in The King of Fighters '94 as the leader to the American Sports Team. Heavy D! was designed with the intent to create a unique type of pugilist. He was added to the series in spirit of other boxing characters popular at the time and gained his tall stature to separate himself from the rest of the cast. He was named after M.C. "Heavy D", a former hip hop artist from the group Heavy D & the Boyz.

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Heavy D! was once a famous boxer, but was expelled from normal competition due to seriously injuring a fighter during battle. He, Lucky Glauber, and Brian Battler received an invitation to the KOF '94 tournament, and formed the American Sports Team (originally known in The King of Fighters '94 as the U.S.A. Team).
Like his teammates, Heavy D!'s invitation is unluckily snatched by opposing teams in this series and other games as a running gag.

Heavy D! is an unorthodox shadowboxer with an extremely unique fighting style. D! relies heavily on defense and countering. He has an arsenal of textbook jabs, straights, hooks, straight hooks, uppercuts, undercuts, and crosses at his disposal. Heavy D!'s '98 stance is even tighter defensive-wise than his '94 counterpart, nearly tucking his face completely behind a set of massive forearms, with very few holes in his guard. He also has a small array of short-ranged, fast punches that can be buffered to become unblockable.